The Mother of all Tech Commercials

Have you ever felt that some commercials look suspiciously like others, and that they all use the same techniques to address you? The humor site College Humor thinks so, and they created the most amazing, mother of all tech ads, to prove they're right.


Indeed, it's nothing but a funny video... that becomes funny because it is so real. And uf you doubt that, you can check some real commercials right next to it, to see for yourself.









[via the Verge]

Pressy - a tiny button in a jack for Android smartphones

If you ever found yourself in a blackout and had to browse through dozens of pages of apps to find the "flashlight" one, you'll know that things aren't quite as simple and easy as they seem. Pressy is a curious Kickstarter project that offers a way to simplify your most needed tasks on your Android smartphone, while doing it with a nice physical click instead of a feeling-less "touch"

The Pressy is a small jack with a micro button on top. Yep, that's all there is about it.

The trick is that it comes with an app that allows you to customize what your smartphone will do when you press it. If you regularly use your smartphone as flashlight you can set it up so it lights up when you click on it. But, you're not restricted to a single operation. You can customize different actions for different click patterns: one long press, one quick press, two long presses, etc.

How about making the double click launching the camera app or the "writing on the screen" feature? Or, make the long press act as a panic button, sending your location to your friends and family warning them something is wrong.

Do give it at look: and it can be yours for just $17, with delivery scheduled for March 2014.

Android VP leaves Google for Xiaomi in China

You may have not hear of Hugo Barra before, but he's one of the few in Google's "high-ranks", and was Android VP. Now, he's about to head halfway across the world and join the ranks of Xiaomi, one of the largest (or the largest) smartphone manufacturers in China - also as VP.

It's still to early to figure out what this means for Android. Xiaomi already has their MIUI operating system - that is based on the open-source Android. Hiring Barra may mean that they either intend to get closer to the standard Android (which I think is unlikely), or - much more likely - intend to use his expertise and experience to further enhance and evolve their own system.

But there's also another small tidbit of info that might have something to do with Hugo Barra leaving Google... Apparently Sergey Brin is no longer with his wife Anne Wojcicki, and is in a relationship with a Google co-worker that has previously been involved with Hugo Barra. Some say that Barra's exit has nothing to do with this... but one can't stop wonder: if NSA's agents have been spying on their love interests, what would you do if you had access to anyone's Gmail account at will? Maybe Barra is indeed better off going to China and work on improving a NSA/Google-resistant mobile OS.

Google drops Nexus 4 price to $199

The Nexus 4 may be nearly a year old but it's still one incredible smartphone for anyone looking for a (more than) decent device. Now, it gets even better, as Google has decided to drop its price from $299 to $199! If you were struggling to decide whether the N4 was a good deal compared with the more recent Chinese devices offering Full HD screens for an identical amount, now Google has again the upper hand.

In the UK and Euro area, de prices are £159 and 199€ for the 8GB model and  199£ / 249€ for the 16GB model ($249 in the US).

Sadly this refresh din't address the issue that the Nexus 4 is still only available at a small number of countries, with the rest of the world having to resort to forwarding services (or bug friends to buy it and sent it). And it also makes the disproportional price bump for the storage even more apparent. Considering the N4 has no microSD slot for memory expansion it's highly recommended to choose the 16GB model - and the extra $50 you have to pay for it (25% of the total price!) is hard to justify when you consider the actual cost for such a chip is just a few bucks!

Anyway... you'll be getting a Nexus, entitled to have the latest Android version without having to worry about it.

The only bad news are for those that were hoping to sell their Nexus 4 in the coming weeks to recoup some money in order to buy the upcoming Nexus smartphone - that should pop up by October or November. With the Nexus 4 now at $199... how much will you be willing to pay for a year old Nexus 4 in second hand? Not much indeed...

Long passwords can now be easily Cracked

Computer power has evolved (and keeps evolving) at an amazing pace. But all that power can be put to use in areas you'd might not want to: like cracking passwords. A decade ago it would seem crazy to try and crack all the possible variations of a 8 character password... today, with the help of the all mighty GPU processing prowess it can be easily done.

This has pushed users into choosing longer passwords. As each extra character you add makes it exponentially harder to crack - and some said the trick would be using pass-phrases instead of pass-words. A phrase is more easily remembered, and it will span dozens of characters, making it nearly impossible to crack... until now.

You'd think choosing a password like "thereisnofatebutwhatyoumake" or evn "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!" would keep you safe. But you'd be wrong.

There's a new version of the popular ocl-Hashcat password cracking program - the ocl-Hashcat-plus - which can now attempt to crack passwords up to 55 chars long (previous versions were limited to 15 chars maximum). These programs can either try and find your password by trying every and all possible leter/number/symbol combination... but that quickly becomes unfeasible for long passwords.

So, the trick is using popular words, passwords, phrases, and several common variations (such as adding a 2 digit number at the end; or replacing some leters by numbers ("E" for "3" and such), as well as applying some common patterns; to narrow down the possibilities from the "quadrillions" to the more manageable billions.

Using a regular PC with two AMD HD 6990 graphic cards, the ocl-Hashcat-plus can test over 223k passwords per second, allowing you to go through the entire 14.3 million passwords of the "RockYou" dictionary in about a minute). That's why a password like "thereisnofatebutwhatyoumake" (from the Terminator movie) or even the cryptic "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!" (from H.P. Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu) can now easily be found.

You can test your passphrase simply by searching for it on Google: if it is found anywhere and returns any results, you better change it to something else.

Just keep in mind this type of password attack requires the access to a password database. Meaning, it isn't something that hackers use to login to your account on Facebook or Gmail. This only works if they have access to the service database, meaning there has already been a security breach - something that unfortunately is becoming increasingly common, and with each newly found password, those attack dictionaries grow and make it easier for everyone else to find similar passwords on other services.

[via Ars]

LOVEINT - NSA admits Agents spying Love Interests

With each passing day we find out more about NSA abusive spying. Just like Snowden had reported, NSA agents do use that vast amount of power to their personal use, with the agency now admitting there have been some cases of what is know being referred to as "LOVEINT" (in regards to the different spying categories used by the NSA: SIGINT - Signals, HUMINT - Human, etc).

We're all humans, and one can imagine just how irresistible it would be to listen in into your spouse, partner, girlfriend, etc. Particularly if there is any kind of suspicion regarding their behavior and they're away for some reason. Don't get me wrong... it's plain human nature, and I think it just proves that no matter how many preventive measures you put in place, the temptation to misuse such amount of power is simply to great to resist - and do keep in mind that in order to get into the NSA and to be able to do that sort of stuff, it is expected you'd have to pass several stringent security and personality tests.

Although PRISM is being touted as an essential tool to prevent "acts of terror", I think one might consider it to be a real "weapon of mass terror" for american citizens as well as the rest of the world. I have no doubt that if this had been done by any other country, the USA would treat it almost as an act of war and wouldn't allow any such spying over its citizens. But in this case... one can't stop but wonder if this will be the "elephant in the room" that will keep being there even if it now has been painted bright red.

Although... if people are more worried about Ben Affleck being the next Batman, and even petition the White House to prevent that from happening... maybe they can't even see it anymore. And that, is probably the scarier part of it all.

Google is Readying Fleet of Robot-Taxis

Everyone knows that Google is working hard to bring driver-less cars to the streets. They've been doing so for a long time, and the time is coming for it to stop being a research project and become a real product. And just like Google decided to build its own hardware to reduce costs and save money, it seems they'll be doing the same with their driverless cars, designing their own cars that will be built to their specifications.

It shouldn't come as a surprise, considering how inefficient is is to apply all the required components in an "after-market" way to a ready built car - that was designed with no such thing in mind. But if you're hoping to get one of these you may have to wait a long time. It seems that Google is readying a fleet os robot-taxis that will be deployed in large metropolitan areas. (Can you imagine the turmoil it will cause among regular taxi services? I can!)

But, looking a bit further... you might want to consider this to be a very big and bold move - that is a sign of things to come. Let's think for a second: if you happen to have a car that can pick you up and drop you off anywhere, for a reasonable service fee... wouldn't you reconsider the need for a personally owned vehicle that will spend most of its time parked somewhere? How does that differ from catching a regular Taxi?

Well... consider all the data Google has about your movement throughout the day, not to mention all the thousands of requests being made simultaneously. Google can crunch all that data in order to make these robot-taxi routes as efficient as technologically possible, providing you with accurate timetables for when you can expect to be picked up and dropped off at your destination, with the car immediately following to the nearest customer and so on, and so on, with minimal "waste".

The only issue is the price you'll have to pay for it, but maybe Google can offer a nice package deal for customers using other services of theirs... or - better yet - make it free, as long as you watch some ads along the way! ;)

Steve Ballmer will retire from Microsoft

To everyone's surprise Steve Ballmer announced his retirement from Microsoft, something that will happen during the next 12 months, as soon as the transition to a new CEO is completed. Ballmer has sent an email to everyone at MS where he states his love for the company and that this is the right time for change.


Although Ballmer has kept Microsoft profitable during the last decade (he's taken over from Bill Gates in 2000), there are an increasing number of concerns about his ability to lead MS into a new era. There have a lot of mistakes in this past decade (remember Kin?) and the way MS let itself out of the mobile race is... appalling to say the least (and Windows RT doesn't seem to have a bright future either). The stocks went up nearly 10% after this announcement, which shows exactly that the time is indeed right for Ballmer to step down.

Now, the big question is: who will be next at MS's helm? Whoever it may be, he/she will certainly have a hard time ahead: Windows Phone is timidly and slowly chipping away at iOS and Android dominance; Windows 8 is failing to convince consumers (and enterprises and saying "no way" to it); Windows RT - well... we know how that is going; and even the Xbox One will have to prove itself against the PS4, after disastrous announcement events that made it look far worse than it actually was. Let's see how the new CEO will handle all that.

Leaked Images of the Gold iPhone

Just the other day we talked about how a gold iPhone could make the gold color fashionable again, and now we have leaked photos of the alleged gold case of the new iPhone 5S - that even includes the larger flash hol, which will supposedly hold two different colored flashes for better color capture under difference lighting circumstances.

As previously said, this images show us that we won't be having an actual "glittering gold" iPhone, but one that is a lot more subtle, in a champagne color tone. A tone that seem to fall right into place alongside the existing black and white/silver models.

In fact, when placed next to the existing models, this new "gold" model makes the the silver model look kind of dull - though in the end, it will be up to each one to decide which one looks best for himself/herself.


What we would really like to see if for Apple - or any other manufacturer - to come up with a new kind of material that could change its colors at will, so we could personalize it at the touch of a button whenever we felt like like it: or even use it as a notification warning: for instance turning it red if there are some urgent calls or messages we have to read, or black when its battery level drops below 15%. That would be something really talking about! :)

e-Ink screen powered by NFC

I'm not a big fan of NFC (considering that most of the "problems" it promises to solve aren't really problems - and could be easily sorted out using other widely available technologies, like bluetooth) but I might be about to change my mind. Just take a look at these ingenious wireless and battery-less e-Ink screen e-Ink screens powered by NFC.

The e-Ink screen can keep the current image without needing any extra power, and the power needed to receive the data and update the screen is harvested by the NFC field itself. It's quite a clever feat, and if it were to be combined with that technology that allows for wireless communications between modules using TV RF transmissions, you'd might be able to come up with lots of interesting devices that would never need to worry about battery life.

For starters, I'd imagine one would appreciate having some kind of digital paper (without the need for batteries, a flexible eInk screen could probably be made as thin as "paper"), that we could keep anywhere - from our desk to the fridge door, and where we could easily upload any image or note by simply touching it with a smartphone. But one can imagine a future where one would have digital travel tickets using this "digital paper", that could be updated to show the current status of the flight, etc.

Let's hope it won't take long for this technology to become commercially available.

Stack Printer chugs along stacks of paper

Let's be honest. When was the last time you looked at a printer and said: "wow! I want one of those!"? Most likely... never (though I have to confess there was a time, long ago, when I was marveled by the sheer brute force approach of line printers, back in the dot matrix needle printer days). But thing may be about to change as you set your eyes on this beauty called Stack, which strips a printer down to its bare essential parts.

This printer lets go of the user paper tray, feeding itself simply by placing it on top of a stack of paper, and it quietly pulls page after page, producing a printed result on top. It looks like a futuristic concept that wouldn't work - but it's inventor has indeed built a working prototype to prove the concept works - though it now needs the final help from a printer manufacturer willing to polish the final details and turn it into a comercial product.

Though I've never had a printer at home (nor had any wish for it), I have to agree that I probably would have to reconsider it if this Stack printer becomes available at a nice price. And considering its main inspiration is getting rid of all the unnecessary parts, why shouldn't it a lot cheaper than any other conventional printer? Let's wait and see if HP, Brother, Lexmark, or any other big brand is courageous enough to bring this printer to fruition.

Portuguese Rooster goes to Space and Lands in Galicia

No, you don't have to worry about Portugal entering a new space race and sending live guinea pigs - or a rooster in this case - to space. The Rooster of Barcelos is a folklore symbol of the town of Barcelos, according to a legend of a wrongfully accused man from Galicia that said that a roasted chicken would crow to prove is innocence, and indeed it did just as he was about to hang.

Fast forward to the present, and the rooster pottery representation is now a national symbol and has been sent to the edge of space aboard a high-altitude helium balloon - with a video to prove it - rising to over 33km high (over 109,000 feet) before bursting and heading back down, curiously ending up in a small rural village of Galicia,.

One could say the Rooster went back to visit the man that gave birth to the legend... :)


[via The Register]

Apple's App Store Screening Process lets Malware Through

One can't really know what goes on in Apple's App Store app approval process, as it is something of a mysterious affair that developers sure would like to understand. But for the end user, the "walled garden" approach makes them a lot more trusting when it comes to installing apps, "knowing" that they've been approved by Apple, and so... they must be safe to use, right?

Not quite, as it has now been demonstrated by some reasearchers that created a malware app that went live on the App Store, passing the verification and approval process: even though it could secretly send tweets, emails, messages, take photos, steal information, redirect you to malware web sites, and report home and ask for further instructions.

The "trick" is that they built it in such a way that the code was broken in different blocks that would only self-assemble after the app was running, and from the reports the app sent home, Apple's verification process only ran the app for a few seconds. As the researchers say, that's clearly not enough, and Apple should implement better app verification processes to prevent this sort of technique.

If not, App Store might end up being a worse place to install apps, as the "illusion" of the safe apps will make users more likely to try out "riskier" apps that they wouldn't try if they were in a public store open to all. This time it was just an example used to demonstrate the issue... next time it may be for real.

Microsoft and Google at "War" over YouTube app for Windows Phone

It would seem something taken from a Daily Show funny sketch: Google has no interest in developing a YouTube app for Windows Phone; Microsoft creates its own app; Google says it violates its terms as it doesn't show ads and allows video downloads, and blocks it; MS and Google say they work together in a new app; MS launches a new app with ads and no downloads; all seems to be well... until the very next day Google blocks it once again.

Microsoft it now complaining Google is being "mean"  and it doesn't give them access to the APIs needed to properly implement their ads. YouTube says it advised Microsoft to use HTML5 to create an App where YouTube could take care of that. But MS insists using HTML5 is unfeasible right now, and points to the fact that neither one of the official YouTube apps for iOS and Android is using HTML5, and are coded using native code - besides, most 3rd party YouTube apps also use workarounds to bypass the apparently restricted public APIs.

No matter which side is "right", there's no doubt that the ones that will "pay" for this are the users - that would prefer both companies to act as grown ups and get their act together and sort things out. MS has a lot to regret about their "scroogled" anti-Google campaigns; and have done more than their share of monopolistic abuse over the decades; but Google was also once known as being the "do no evil" company. I sure wouldn't like to see those roles end up being reversed in the coming years.

Ebay My Gadgets helps you appraise your gadgets

Most of my "geek" friends can be considered to be either of two kinds of people: they buy gadget that they love and cherish for the rest of their lives, keeping them in their own "gadget museum" next to all the other obsolete pieces they've gathered throughout the years; or they quickly sell the gadgets they buy, while "new", in order to make a nice amount they can use to help buy the next new gadget they want.

In either case, it isn't always easy keeping track of how much gadgets are worth, and Ebay wants to help you with that with their new "My Gadgets" section where you can simply say which gadgets you have and instantly see how much they're worth should you want to sell them.

It's the type of tool that may help you realize just how much (or how little) your gadget stash is really worth, and maybe serve as a reminder that you may indeed be able to get that just-announced new gadget for a lot less money... should you be willing to part some of your older gadgets (that you most likely won't be using anymore anyway!)

CheapCast turns any Android device into Chromecast

Google's ChromeCast has made a lot of people interested in cheap media streaming devices that turn your big screen TV into a secondary screen you can send your mobile content to. But you don't actually need to get a ChromeCast device to be able to achieve that. Using the CheapCast app, you can turn any Android device into a ChromeCast receiver, allowing you to stream content to it just like you would do with the real one.

CheapCast acts as a ChromeCast emulator, and while it won't make much sense using it to stream videos to your smartphone or tablet, things start to look better when you consider all those cheap Android media player HDMI sticks you can find online for cheap. In this case, the one we used was a MK809 HDMI Stick Android that can be found for less than $50 - and as you'll be able to see, it works like a charm.

If you're really interested in getting a ChromeCast, then you'll probably be better buying the real one. But if you happen to have one of the Android media players around, then maybe you won't have to spend any extra money to be able to do the same... and more. For instance, this way, you'll even be able to run XBMC as well - now with AirPlay support - and stream videos from iPhone and iPads as well. Do try and do the same with an actual ChromeCast. :)

Hustle - Wireless Battery Bag/Wallet for Smartphones

No matter what kind of smartphone you buy, there's one thing you'll never be completely satisfied with: it's battery life. Most high-end smartphones can barely go a couple of days without charging, and some struggle to last to the end of the day if you really dare to actually use it as you'd wish. There's a new project in Indiegogo that aims to help with that: the wireless charging bag Hustle.

The concept is the same as all those mobile battery extenders, but here it is nicely hidden as a small bag/wallet that can go unnoticed anywhere (and available in male/female versions).

One other nice touch is that it can be recharged wirelessly - using the Qi wireless power standard - so you need only drop the bag/wallet on top of the wireless charger to charge it (and recharge you smartphone as well, if it's plugged in into it.

The Hustle bag/wallet costs $139 with an included Qi wireless charging pad. It's not cheap, but considering you get a portable 4250mAh battery that looks good to us in any occasion, and a Qi charging station you can use to charge any other Qi device, like the Google Nexus 4, Nokia Lumia 920, or HTC Windows Phone 8X... it may end up not being a bad deal after all.

KeyMe App allows you to Copy Keys in

The old "there's an app for that" can now be used once again should you be prone to losing your house keys or find yourself frequently locked out of your home. The KeyMe app allows you to simply clone any key by simply taking a picture of your keys.

While you can't have the duplicate key right away (maybe a portable 3D printer embedded in your smartphone will allow you to do that in the not so distant future), you can simply have the keys delivered to your home, or drive to your nearest locksmith and ask them for a code cut key with the code the app shows you.

I can't really say if I would be comfortable having my key info in my smartphone (and stored in the cloud)... But when we consider we probably have lots of other valuable information in our emails, online bank accounts, etc. already stored and accessible via our smartphones... I think it might be just a false sense of security.

Also worth mentioning, most of these common locks can be easily opened by anyone with minor lock picking training / or no training whatsoever if they have the right tools. So... maybe it's time we just learn to live with the way things are, make our best to keep things safe - but keeping in mind that if someone is willing to put the time and the effort to get them, they'll probably will.

Piksi High Precision GPS offers centimeter accuracy on Kickstarter

The GPS system is a technical marvel. Having begun as a way for the military to accurately track where in the globe they were, it has since made its way into our daily lives and... our pockets. Our smartphones use it to help us find nearby places, or even tell us where they are should they be lost or stolen. However, civilian applications can use its full precision, and our GPS receivers usually have an accuracy of 5-10 meters - good enough to get you from point A to point B... but not good enough if you're trying to make your autonomous flying robot follow a path between obstacles just 1 meter apart. Enter Piksi, a Kickstarter project that offers much higher precision, allowing for centimeter accuracy.

Although there are high-precision GPS receivers available, they usually cost ten times as much as this Piksi (which itself isn't that cheap, at $900). Besides the high precision, Piksi also gives location information 50 times per second - well more useful than the usual one per second of regular receivers.

The project was already surpassed its objective - which shows just how much there are people interested in this kind of technology - and hopefully it will find its way into backers' hands without delays.

For me, I just hope that someday, our smartphones will be able to pinpoint our location with identical accuracy! :)

VW SmileDrive aims to make driving fun

Tired of facing horrific traffic day in and day out? VW wants to make driving fun, and it has now partnered with Google to bring you the SmileDrive Android app to make you smile behind the wheel. This app will track your driving and give you a score and achievements as you reach certain milestones - as miles driven, driving by another SmileDriver, or passing an identical vehicle. But the real fun part is when you use it to make longer trips.

If you're going on a road trip, the SmileDrive app can broadcast your location in real time for your friends to know where you are, as well as upload photos, and create a complete journal to later remind you of all the fun you had.

The only sad part is that the app is restricted to the USA (don't ask me why... does VW or Google think there are no roads in other countries?) So, if you're in a country where you can't use this app, my suggestion is for you to use the even more amazing Waze. It may not have as many bells and whistles, but it also has a very strong community support, and allows you to see live reports from other users (as well as allow you to report all sorts of thing you can see on the road - from traffic to accidents - complete with photos if you want). You can even chat with other wazers if you want to; as well as share your real-time location with friends (a nice feature when you have a group of people meeting somewhere and want to track down where everybody is.)

MixBit- the anti-social Video app from YouTube's co-founders

There's a new video app in town, that will have to prove itself among all other video apps around, particularly the two current giants: Twitter's Vine and Facebook's Instagram. This MixBit (site will be available later today) would most likely pass by unnoticed, if it weren't for the fact that it was created by two of YouTube's co-founders.

At first, this MixBit seems like any other short video apps. You can record up to 16s video clips, but with a strong editing component - the "mix" part - where you can mix up to 256 short clips to create about an hour long movie.

There's just one extra tidbit that might catch you off-guard: the videos are published anonymously, there are no user names, nor comments. Something that might be as frighting as refreshing, depending on how you look at it. In a world where most seek their 15 seconds of fame, and fight for an extra "like/retweet/+1" on their content, this MixBit breaks it all apart and promotes sharing for the simple act of sharing, with nothing in return. Will it succeed or be just a big flop? We'll have to wait and see..

The MixBit app for iOS is already available in the App Store; Android version should popup in Google Play soon.

Xerox WorkCenter Scanners Randomly Alter Numbers

There are certain things in life you take for granted. The sky is blue, water is wet, and photocopiers and scanners copy whatever we place on them. Unfortunately, that isn't the case should you happen to have a Xerox WorkCenter photocopier.

You see... these Xerox models have the tendency to randomly alter block of numbers, which might result in either some funny mistakes to, more likely, a lot of wasted time trying to figure out why numbers don't add up - or, worse of all, potentially causing a mishap that might even endanger people.

The problem seems to have been narrowed down to image compression system Xerox uses (JBIG2) which tries to save memory by looking for identical blocks on the image, and when it finds blocks that are sufficiently similar, it just replaces the actual image block by something saying "this block is just like the one located there". The issue ist that sometimes, a different block is considered to be identical to other... and the resulting image ends up with a repeated block of number that isn't what is actually there.

We'll have to wait and see Xerox's answer to this eye opening bug, that show us how technology can sometimes mess up even the most basic assumptions we would never think of questioning. Would you really doubt your scanner or photocopier wouldn't be copying the original as it is? I for sure would not.

Philips Hue adds LED strips and Portable Bloom Lamps to the family

Philips is about to expand its family of Philips Hue smart LED lamps with other kinds of LED illumination that will certainly be welcomed by everyone that has a special attraction for decorative lighting (such as... me). After the regular styled LED light bulbs you can install in any regular lamp socket, Philips now brings us Philips Hue LED strips, and also a Bloom portable lamp you can place anywhere without concern about having a power socket nearby - which you'll be able to use to create great color scenes whenever the need arises.

Just like the original Hue LED lamps, the major thing in favor of this range of products (over those that come with a simple remote control) is that you can easily control them in a variety os ways. Besides being able to control it via a smartphone app or via preset scheduled routines, you can also create complex patterns and alerts using services like IFTTT (you can, for instance, make one of these lights flash when you have an incoming urgent email - or change its color if it's going to rain; or any other number of things you might come up with).

The only thing between you and all this is... it's price. At $89.95 for a 2m LED strip and $79.95 for the portable Bloom lampm it isn't exactly cheap - and you'll still need the Hue Hub ZigBee gateway that comes with the original Philips Hue pack ($199.95). I'm still glad to see Philips pushing this technology forward and making it available for consumers... but I hope it won't take long for it to come down in price so that every LED lamp can have this sort of control included, without any noticeable increase in price.

How to Fix Portrait Video Recording Problem

Smartphones have become the most popular video recording devices, being always a few instants away from recording anything we're seeing. However, they've also become the cause for one of the most dreaded phenomena in video history: the portrait video recording. There's no way around it - no matter how much you may feel like "it won't look that bad"... it certainly will. When you play back video recorded in portrait (vertical) orientation on your computer screen or big screen TV, you'll be treated to a very narrow slice of video surrounded by gigantic black borders. It's terrible to the point that apps like YouTube even alert you not to do so and block the portrait video recording behind a configuration setting.

But today I'll be giving away the solution to the portrait video problem. A solution that would certainly be patentable, but that I'm offering for free.

For it to work the only requirement is for the camera sensor vertical resolution to be greater than 1920 pixels. Which, considering that most smartphones come with 5MP, 8MP, and higher resolution cameras, won't be a problem.

Take a 5MP camera sensor, for instante, with 2592x1944 pixels - barely enough for my technique to work.

The trick would be for the video to be recorded in a small subset window of the sensor, that would keep the horizontal aspect ratio even though the sensor was vertically aligned. Technically this wouldn't be a problem, as most CMOS sensors allow you to easily define a "Region of Interest"  (RoI) area, that is the one that is sent out to be processed. This technique would even allow for the usual digital stabilization, with the recording region being adjusted to compensate for camera shake, etc.

Considering it's often more comfortable to hold a smartphone vertically with a single hand, than it is to hold it horizontally (requiring two hands), this would certainly be a awesome feature - that would cost next to nothing to implement.

So, if you're a big brand or manufacturer and wish to use this technique, go ahead. Just be sure to send me some of the first devices using it as a token of appreciation and good will. :)

Ubuntu Edge Funding starts to Stall

Looks like reality is finally bringing down the highly regarded Ubuntu Edge funding project. The goal of $32 million seemed quite high, but a meteoric first week that reached $7 million made many think that this project might actually make it. However, after the initial hype, that's when the funding starts to really show how it's going.

To put things in perspective, while the Ubuntu Edge campaign got $7 million in roughly 7 days, since then it has struggled for days to make it to the $8 million mark. Not a good sign if you consider that it should be making at least $1 million per day (in average) in order to make it to the desired goal. It's still a lot of money pouring in each day, but not nearly enough to make it to the $32 million goal.

Some still think that Canonical and/or its partners will jump in and save the day at the very last moment, to make this project real, if needed. But on the other hand, we're talking about less than 3000 buyers at this moment - a far cry from the volume needed to make such a project viable. You just need to take a look at devices from Apple, Samsung, and others, that sell millions in a the first couple of days after reaching the stores. A few thousands is nothing but a small inconsequential "blip" that goes unnoticed.

Let's see how this Ubuntu Edge turns out... but even though I've backed it right from the very beginning, I'm afraid this is more likely to end up as being one of the most well played vaporware campaigns of all times.

SnappyCam takes 8MP full-res Photos on the iPhone at 20fps (or so it says)

The SnappyCam app is quite popular among iOS users, as it allows us to take snapshots at faster rates than the native camera app. Unfortunately, to do so it had to drop the picture quality to 3MP. But now, in its latest version, its developers says it has made a breakthrough that allows his app to take full resolution 8MP photos at 20fps in an iPhone 5.

To do so, John Papandriopoulos says it had to completely reinvent the way JPEG works, in order to maximize every step of the image processing process, from the sensor data to the buffering and compression and storage of the final images. I have nothing personal against Mr. Papandriopoulos, but when I come across something that seems too good to be true... my feelings are highly doubtful.

I doubt that the iPhone 5 CMOS sensor array is even capable of working at that speed at full resolution, which would be something quite close to the requirements for the sensor to be able to record UltraHD 4K video.

If we consider raw data from the sensor (meaning, just 1 byte of data for each of its 3264x2448 pixels - which will be processed somewhere down the line - debayering to produce a color image) a FullHD video stream would require about 59MB/s throughput, that would be processed and compressed using the hardware encoder/codecs. To process a 8MP image at 20fps, you're talking more that twice that amount: 154MB/s.

If there was a "mysterious" way to make the sensor work at that pixel rate, you would also be able to make it recorde Full HD video at over 60fps.

Looking at the example photos on the official site, anyone can see those are not full resultion 8MP photos. At the very best those are interpolated lowe resolution photos bumped up in size to make it look like they have more resolution (with no extra detail than the lower resolution photos).

If you're willing to trust him, do go ahead and buy the SnappyCam - but if you do, please do a quick test comparing the photos taken with the native camera app, and one captured at 20fps with this app.

Galaxy S4 Active not so Waterproof after all?

Looks like Samsung's Galaxy S4 Active is about to be awash in regards to its waterproof capabilities. According to some users, it looks like there's a suspicious amount of S4 Active smartphones dying or malfunctioning after being submerged.

There's a chance that this might be due to improper usage - for the S4 Active to be waterproof you need to make sure you have the back cover properly installed and its ports covered with protective plugs. But in some cases, the reports come from people that are absolutely sure they did everything right, and the water sill managed to get in. And strangely enough, Samsung does not cover water damage on the S4... which sounds kind of strange for a "waterproof" device.

Maybe the best thing is for you to pass on waterproof smartphones until its manufacturer does cover water damage - meaning they're absolutely certain there's no way you can get it wrong and can safely use it in/under water. Until then, maybe its better for you to postpone that water submersion test you had planned to impress your friends.

eTeleporter allows eye contact calls on Facetime

It's kind of sad to see that, with so much technology available, there are still so many tiny things that are completely disregarded - but that could do wonders for us. For instance, how do you feel about videocalls? We can now do Facetime, Skype, Hangouts, videocalls from anywhere around the world... but do you feel there's still something missing? Indeed you're right. As the camera and screen are in different places, videocalls become a interaction between two people that seem to be looking at... somewhere else. Not exactly the thing you'd expect when talking to someone. This eTeleporter hopes to change that, allowing eye-contact on videocalls, and is counting on Kickstarter to make it happen.

The eTeleporter uses a clever mirror system (using a two-way mirror) to project the video image while allowing the camera behind to record your face looking directly at the image. The result is that you can actually look at the person you're talking to and be recorded as doing so.

The only drawback is that its designed to work solely with the iPad and it costs $99 (or $85 if you're fast enough to get one of the first units). But if you spend most of your time doing FaceTime calls during the day and use an iPad to do it... it may not be such a bad deal after all (though for best effect you'd also want the person on the receiving end to have an eTeleporter as well.)